My question is to the Premier.

This morning, in the media studio, Maria Sardelis and Cherie Vandevenne spoke about the terrible suffering caused by the illegal use of the trespass act by care homes. Far too often. when caregivers make complaints about poor standards of care, facility operators retaliate by using the Ontario trespass act illegally to permanently ban entrance to family members.

Will this government ensure that care home operators cannot hide from accountability by using the trespass act to punish patients and their loved ones?

In March 2021, this House unanimously passed a motion, presented by my colleague from Ottawa Centre, stating that the government of Ontario would “provide clear direction to operators of retirement, long-term care and group homes that they cannot use the Trespass to Property Act to ban family members who speak out about their loved ones’ living conditions.”

Will this government fulfil this commitment from 2021 by posting clear direction in publicly accessible spaces in every care facility in Ontario and ensure, also, that the police forces no longer misapply the trespass act by blocking families from visiting their loved ones?

You had four years to improve the system and made it infinitely worse over those four years. The system has been in desperate crisis for that whole time.

The health care crisis is hitting northerners especially hard, and Bill 7 will make the crisis worse, not better. Forcing seniors to move 300 kilometres away from their loved ones will be devastating and traumatic for elders and their families. Currently in Thunder Bay–Superior North, we face—actually, we have beds. We have some beds, but there’s no staff, and this has been going on for a long time.

Seniors and persons with disabilities are being defined as bed-blockers by this government, only to be repurposed as profit enhancers for privately owned homes when they haven’t fulfilled their 98% fullness to get their full public allotment of dollars. Why is this government refusing to address the staffing crisis that is the source of the funding crisis?

My question is to the Premier.

During the Mike Harris Conservative government, a major transfer of public assets into private hands took place in the privatization of many long-term-care homes—a transfer of public funds that continues to benefit associates of the Conservative Party.

During COVID, members of the military reported horrendous conditions that directly contributed to the high number of deaths in these same for-profit homes. Sadly, I am hearing exactly the same concerns today.

I was recently contacted by a PSW I will name Susan, who told me she is often the only staff member looking after residents. No nurses, no other PSWs, no cleaners, no one at the front desk screening visitors—and not even paper towels at the handwashing stations.

Can the Premier tell me why, after learning of the dreadful conditions in for-profit homes during COVID, he has not shut down homes that do not meet even the most basic standard of care?

Susan, the PSW, made a formal complaint to an inspector, who called her back, saying there were no problems at the home. Clearly, the inspector did not attend the home in person. The personal support worker subsequently experienced reprisals from the home’s manager for calling an inspector. This is an example of a for-profit home clearly placing profits over care.

Can the minister tell me why they sold more bed licences to the same long-term-care homes already identified as not providing good care, and why inspectors are not shutting down non-compliant homes?